Encrypting files in the bid to enhance security

The practice of storing physical copies of records has been increasingly phased out in recent years as businesses and consumers alike have opted to take advantage of the vast volumes of space found on hard drives and virtual servers.

With document scanning enabling them to digitise files and the use of computers for everything related to data capture becoming ever more normalised, it has very much been a case of taking records off of the shelves and backing them up online due to the way in which this makes it easier to both share and access information.

Yet whereas before it was possible to simply lock files in a cupboard and keep hold of they key to avoid their falling into the wrong hands, the transition towards the virtual world has thrown up all manner of problems in finding an effective way to provide as sufficient a safeguard to digital documents.

So in order to ensure that companies do not have the sensitive records that they store on their hard drives and on the web compromised, David Mahdi, product manager at Entrust.com, says that data encryption is the answer.

"One of the clear-cut ways to protect information is with encryption," he said. "That is, just doing hard drive encryption, using email encryption and doing all this kind of stuff."

According to Mr Mahdi, data comes in two main forms – data at rest and data in motion – and both need protecting to avoid any breaches or thefts that could compromise sensitive information.

Data at rest relates to that which is stored on physical hard drives and computers, while data in motion involves communications such as anything sent by email.

And taking into account the need to provide adequate protection to confidential files no matter where they are stored, it seems that encryption needs to be considered as one of the ideal ways to do so.